


From Steel To Gold

by crestedhearts (orphan_account)



Category: Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:40:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24552535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/crestedhearts
Summary: You struggle with your hunger pangs. Rufus Shinra does not.
Relationships: Rufus Shinra/Reader
Comments: 10
Kudos: 105





	From Steel To Gold

THE FIRST TIME IT HAPPENED, you were sitting in Seventh Heaven and trying to ignore the excited chatter and boisterous energy around you. You had just ordered what would be your meal for the night and the next morning─it was all you could afford, given your meager salary as a scrap collector. Tifa had given you a hefty discount, since you helped her out a lot by finding spare parts and fitting them to the building when she needed it, but you sometimes suspected it was out of pity.

Your dinner─a plate consisting of two pork chops, rice, and a small salad─had cost you twenty gil. In the eyes of some, that was cheap, practically a penny out of their pockets; but for you, that was half your salary gone, and you rationed out the rest through cheaply packaged ramen that ran for one gil at the market. You weren't very healthy as a result, but Tifa did her best to meet at least some of your body's nutritional requirements with what you could afford to buy. She had even slipped you a free slice of pie and a beer, said it was on her for helping out with watching Marlene, and disappeared before you could argue.

When you couldn't afford even ramen, you bought food replacement tablets. They were cheaper than even those packets of noodles, could be gotten anywhere, and worked well enough to keep your appetite low as long as you didn't burn off too many calories working. Compared to you, Tifa and her group were well off, and they bought more food than they could handle. They didn't even box the rest up; Tifa would, though, and stow it away for later for them. It made you angry, and a little jealous.

So when you had gotten the barest sip of your beer and tasted the most exquisite flavors you had ever been privy to in your entire life, you felt your mind go white trying to catch up with it. You had never tasted this before, whatever it was─it was strong, and tasted like pizza smelled, but it was… off, more potent.

Your sister, before she married and moved topside, had told you about this; that people, when they were a certain age, tasted what their soulmate was eating. She also had said sometimes people have threads, others have telepathic thoughts, and even names on their arms. There was no real rhyme or reason to it, she told you, but it helped narrow down the selection pool to general salaries. Whatever that meant.

The taste still lingering in your mouth, you looked down at your pork chops in disappointment, knowing you would not get the same satisfaction out of your food. You ate with a mechanical slowness, forcing yourself to appreciate what you got and to savor it. The beer and pie was only a little satisfying, mostly to your sweet tooth, but as you were walking to the bar to pay Tifa, the taste changed. Your soulmate was taking dessert, it seemed, because all you could taste was the cloying sweetness of strawberries and sugar, something tart or somewhat bitter.

Your stomach felt very, very empty.

You paid Tifa and she rung up your receipt.

"How was the pie?" She asked, her eyes bright. Keen on conversation. "Did you like it? You were pretty slow tonight."

"I'm sorry." You took the receipt from her and stuffed it down your bra with a sigh, too lazy to flip open the button lapel at your breast. "I just got my first… soulmate taste thing. Whatever you call it. I wish I could have enjoyed it more, to be honest."

"Really?" Tifa motioned for you to sit down. Clearly you weren't going anywhere until she got all of the details out of you, haven't experienced it herself yet. "Tell me all about it and I won't get offended."

"I'll take that," you laughed. Your stomach clenched uncomfortably, tasting the delicious dessert your soulmate was having but confused when nothing came down. "I don't know about the main course, but the dessert had fresh strawberries… I remember those from when my mom would steal them from up topside. Sugar. Something bitter, but with its own sweetness. I've only ever eaten ramen and your food my whole life so I can't say what it was."

You hadn't noticed that Cloud had taken a seat one over from you until he spoke.

"That sounds like the Soireé up top." When you blinked at the long absent merc with confusion, he elaborated grudgingly,"A lot of Shinra execs would eat it. It's a dessert. Strawberries and blueberries. I overheard a conversation about it. Sounds like what you were describing."

"Oh, so they must have money, then, to eat topside," Tifa gasped. "I wonder who it could be!"

"I don't know." You shrugged and rubbed your stomach, grimacing at the twang of pain. "Well, I'll head on home now. Thanks for the pie, Tifa. Just call if you need anything."

"Sure thing, [Name]! Get home safe."

For the next five years, you suffered with your soulmate's eating habits, and over time, you got good at determining when they ate. Their favorite food seemed to be some kind of soup that had very little flavor, but their palette was large and vast. They ate three times a day, ate a snack inbetween, or drank some gods awful concoction of chocolate and bitter powder that you couldn't stand and took days to get out of your mouth.

In those five years, you had gone from lowly scrap collector to the illustrious Madame M's secretary and student. She boarded you and fed you extremely better food than you had ever eaten before, supplied you with a far more generous salary because she liked you and treated you like a daughter, and even helped you get healthy and into physical shape.

You could massage someone's hand like nobody's business, or even do the poor man's massage, but what you really specialized in was a unique method of acupuncture that stimulated relaxation and blood flow. Madame M had deemed you successful enough to take your own clients, but refused to let you take hers; you had to gather your own.

So topside you went, clothed in traditional garb as she had told you, with your hair pinned up and decorated with jewels from Madame M's prized collection. She had given them to you with a proud smile, along with some rather serious looking adoption papers that would allow her to become your official mother. Even at twenty-nine years old you had cried like a baby and hugged her. She didn't even tut like she normally would and hug you back.

But as soon as you were topside, you couldn't resist it.

You tracked down the restaurant that sold the Soireé.

+

When Rufus woke up tasting strawberries and blueberries in his mouth, he sat ramrod straight in his chair. At his feet, Darkstar whined and nudged his knee, but he ignored it and focused more intently on the flavors playing on his tongue.

It was the unique taste of a Soireé.

Over the years, he had tasted many things, things that he had looked up and found belonged to the slummers, then the middle class elite, or the oriental flavors of Wall Market cuisines. None of it had ever come close to touching the foods that he ate or the indulgences he found himself to favor, but this was the first time he had ever tasted something so expensive from his soulmate.

A slummer no more, it seemed.

He raised an eyebrow and hit a number on a rotary phone his father insisted on keeping. "Tseng."

"Yes, Mister President?"

"Find out who's eating a Soireé at Vallei Astra."

Tseng was very, very quiet for a few moments. He wisely didn't question it. "Yes sir. I'll be back with you in a moment."

+

She sat on the back patio facing a genuine ray of sunshine. The manager had escorted him to her with a sickly smile, sweating bullets, and mumbled under his breath the entire time while he did. Rufus had quickly made him leave once he got sight of his target.

She wore the oriental styles of the Wall Market; a black kimono, a dark purple obi, and brilliant red and white cranes and dragonflies sewn into it with a careful hand. A very expensive piece of silk indeed. She wore true jewels in her hair, a far cry from a slummer's jewelry, and from behind, wore her hair in a high bun with some strands left to dangle around her shoulders.

He had seen Madame M once, when she answered a personal call for his father. She had left the building in a rage, but he had heard her yelling at him when the massage had been finished. Her obi har been untied when she left. Rufus could only assume his father had been attempting to make her his mistress.

This girl, her student, was bound to be a spitfire.

He straightened his tie and stepped outside. A pair of cool, calm [color] eyes turned and regarded him, a plucked eyebrow raised, as if asking who dared to interrupt her dessert. Even sitting, she looked down her nose at him.

Oh, yes, he would enjoy every part of this… Starting with those eyes.

**Author's Note:**

> Should this be a series, too? Yay? Nay? Obviously it would be more fleshed out like Red Strings is! Let me know! :)


End file.
